Late summer, 366 AD—the Isle of Skye
The fort of Dun Ardtreck
Tea stood high on the walls of Dun Ardtreck and watched the men bring her father’s body home from battle.
Her brother wept as he led the shaggy pony pulling a litter up the incline. The other warriors trailed behind Loc and his pony, many of them limping or cradling injured limbs. From her vantage point, atop the stacked-stone wall, Tea could not see the face of the corpse upon the litter, but she knew it could only be her father. She had not seen her brother weep since they were children. Ice-cold dread slithered down her spine.
“Father,” she whispered, her voice catching in her throat.
She did not want to believe it.
Domech mac Bred was a true warrior of An t-Eilean Sgitheanach—The Winged Isle that lay just beyond the edge of the mainland. He had been destined to die protecting the island from invaders, not in some bloody skirmish with the Eagles of Dun Ringill.
Shock chilled Tea to the core and for a moment she forgot to breathe.
Then she swept her heavy fur cloak close and descended the stairs from the high wall. Her leather foot coverings scraped on rough stone as she flew down the steps and sprinted toward the gates of Dun Ardtreck.
Behind her rose a great, stone broch—a round tower house made of stone—and beyond that a sheer rock face rose higher still. Shaped like an enormous beehive, Dun Ardtreck perched upon a rocky knoll, on the edge of a cliff, smoke snaking from two slits in its great roof.
To the west, the waters of Loch Bracadale glittered in the late afternoon sun and a chill breeze blew in, a sharp reminder that summer was ending and Harvest Fire was on its way. To the north lay the mouth of Loch Harport and the naked brown crags of the headland beyond. Loch Harport itself stretched east, cutting inland in a long finger and forming the Minginish Peninsula where Tea’s people ruled.
Breathing hard, Tea reached a dry stone wall and passed through a wide archway. There, she waited at the entrance to the cleft between two rocks—the only entrance to the fort—for her father’s party to arrive.
Loc had wiped the tears from his face by the time he emerged before the gates. Tall and dark, like Tea, her brother walked as if he carried a great weight upon his shoulders. He was limping and leaned against his pony for support. Blood encrusted his right leg and he bore a nasty gash to his left shoulder.
His cousin, Wid, a burly young man with long black hair, walked a few paces behind Loc. Barely out of boyhood, Wid looked badly shaken. His youthful face, with just a fuzz of dark beard starting to grow on his chin, was ashen beneath a layer of grime and blood.
The procession inched closer, and then Loc was standing before her.
“Tea.” Her brother’s gaze met hers. They had the same colored eyes—those of their dead mother—deep midnight blue. His red-rimmed eyes and swollen face told the story Tea had been dreading to hear. “Father fell.”
She stared at him, horror rendering her speechless. Stiffly, as if she was sleep-walking, she stepped around him and stopped before the litter.
Domech son of Bred, chieftain of her people, lay there—as dead, grey and cold as stone. Blood was splattered across his pale face, from the slash wound across his throat.
“Who did this?” she finally croaked.
“Their chief, Muin,” Loc replied, his own voice rough with grief, “but not before father delivered a fatal blow to his belly.”
Forcus, a warrior with curly brown hair and pale blue eyes, stepped up beside Loc. The man’s gaze met Tea’s, direct and bold as usual. A year earlier, she and Forcus had briefly been lovers. Although their union had ended, the pair had remained close ever since.
“Muin died screaming,” Forcus informed her. “Domech made him suffer before the end.”
Tea stared at him, barely able to take the words in. Then she looked down at her father’s face. Even in death he looked formidable; a warrior to strike fear into the hearts of his enemies.
Her gaze shifted away from her father to the last stragglers as they limped their way into the fort. The other warriors walked by them. Bloodied and beaten, they were a sorry sight. “So few have returned,” she whispered.
“It was an ambush,” Forcus told her, his voice flint-hard. “They were waiting for us.”
Tea stepped back from the chieftain’s corpse, her attention shifting to her brother. Such was her shock at seeing her father dead that she had barely noticed Loc’s injuries.
“You’re hurt.” She stepped toward him, her gaze shifting from the blood-soaked leg of his plaid breeches to the deep laceration on his shoulder. “Eithni needs to tend your wounds.”
Loc shook his head, brushing off her concern. He did not want a fuss made of him, not when their father lay dead just a few feet away. However, speaking of their sister made Tea’s belly twist.
Eithni would be broken by the news—and it would fall upon Tea to tell her.
Tea brushed out her father’s long, dark hair, and marveled at how little grey he had in it. At forty three winters, he still looked to be in the prime of life.
She and Eithni stood in an alcove within the broch, where they were preparing Domech mac Bred for his burial. Beside Tea, Eithni wept as she painted curling blue designs over her father’s chest. He bore a number of tattoos, including a wolf’s head on his right arm, but many of them had faded with age—the paint brought them back to life.
Tea blinked back tears of her own and slid silver and gold rings studded with amber onto her father’s fingers. They had dressed him in his finest clothes, including a long robe that reached his ankles. The robe was trimmed with a fur collar and hemmed in gold.
Tea inhaled deeply and scrubbed at the tears that trickled down her cheeks. Stay strong. Grief sat like a boulder in her chest but she would not succumb to it.
Eithni drew back from her father and put aside her brush and clay pot of woad paint. Her face was wet, her eyes swollen—yet Eithni’s grief had not prevented her from carrying out her duties.
Silently, the sisters now made the final touches to their father’s appearance. Tea placed Domech’s iron sword, which he had carried through so many battles, upon his chest, and folded his hands across its bronze pommel. His wooden shield, covered with leather and stained with the mark of The Wolf, she lay across his legs.
Their father would go to meet The Mother looking his finest.
Dusk was settling over Dun Ardtreck as the procession of mourners carried the chieftain’s body out to the barrows. Domech mac Bred would now join his forefathers in a stone cairn to the south east of the broch. The men held him aloft upon a bier.
Tea and Eithni walked behind the warriors bearing the chieftain, at the head of the group of mourners. Her sister was weeping again, yet Tea was dry-eyed.
Tears would not help now. Only vengeance would soothe her aching heart.
They reached the row of stone mounds and brought the chieftain’s body to the closest of the cairns. Its entrance was a gaping dark mouth, yawning to receive him.
As the eldest daughter, Tea stepped up to sing the lament. Had her mother still been alive, this would have been her role. Inhaling deeply, Tea steeled herself for the outpouring of emotion that was to follow.
She began the song. At first her voice was low and tremulous, but then it rose to great heights soaring above the mourners and becoming part of the grey dusk.
Great Domech mac Bred
Go to your long sleep.
Taken cruelly
Slain without honor
Too soon.
Too soon.
The last strains of Tea’s voice died away, and behind her she heard quiet sobs. Her own heart was racing, slamming against her ribs like a battle drum. The warriors slid the chieftain’s body into his final resting place, sealing the entrance with a heavy slab of stone. Beside Tea, Eithni gave a choked cry of grief and buried her face in her hands. Tea stepped close to her and wrapped an arm around her sister’s shaking shoulders.
Bile rose in Tea’s throat and her chest ached from the force of the rage and sorrow that warred for dominance within her.
The People of The Eagle had no honor. Tea would have her reckoning. She would see the earth stained crimson for this treachery.